Readers Voice: Aug. 1, 2014

Curious as to what Natalie Tennant and Shelley Moore Capito plan on doing in the Senate after January 2017, when it will no longer be possible to “fight President Obama.” Both should be embarrassed by their equally miserable campaigns; I am embarrassed for them, and for the great state they claim to love. Neither will be the senator that West Virginia so desperately needs.

I did not vote for Barack Obama, and it had nothing to do with his color. But I listened to his promises of hope, change and transparency in government and I wanted him to succeed. Instead, we are divided even further, not by color necessarily, but because of his political actions or inactions. He is the poorest leader this country has ever had.

I don’t understand why the people of West Virginia refuse to accept that the coal industry is dying. We have to accept that new and cleaner forms of energy will come. You act as though coal is the only industry that we have to offer.

Republicans in Congress insist that everything should be paid for. Closing down our government cost us, the taxpayers, $24 billion. Now filing a frivolous lawsuit against our president will cost us, the taxpayers, millions more. What hypocrites.

Are the speaker and the governor going to cave into the oil and gas lobbyists and let some storage tanks go uninspected? Just because it is small or out of the way doesn’t mean it should not be inspected. All liquids run downhill and end up in a river. The bill was to protect all people of the state, not just the Elk River. It comes down to being for clean water or against it. There is no middle ground.

The latest Supreme Court ruling that corporations have the same rights as individuals, brings to mind a question that I have. A lot of our manufactures have moved their base from the United States to offshore locations to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. Isn’t it illegal for broadcast TV to be airing political commercials funded by donations from these foreign-based companies?

Add me to the list of Natalie Tennant supporters that think she is making a mistake by pandering to coal. Coal is no longer king in West Virginia.

Does the person wanting to supply Hamas with missiles even realize Hamas has fired 10 times as many at Israel than Israel has fired in defense? Israel has offered several cease fire offers but it is Hamas that keeps firing.

The Democrats are just as guilty as Republicans when it comes to doing nothing in Congress. They know continued support of Obama’s agenda will put them out of office so they’re not trying to pass any more of his unconstitutional bills.

Despite the media and their demonizing portrayal of those allegedly rich Koch brothers who are apparently working to get Republicans elected, try living in a household like I do where there are registered voters of each persuasion and it becomes evident by the volume of mail and the daily barrage of phone calls which party really has money to spend.

Your editorial about the GOP’s platform of being anti women did not go far enough. You should have given examples of Rep. Capito’s voting record. She votes along party lines against women almost 100 percent of the time. Against minimum wage, against equal wages for women, against medical care, against education.

President Obama and the EPA are not killing coal. The market has taken care of that. Coal has always been boom or bust and we all know who gets the bust. Just about every coal county in West Virginia has substandard living and education. All due to coal operators taking all the wealth with them. Look back on history in this state, and you will see the future if we continue to think coal is all we have to offer.

I am a veteran and I am sick just sick listening to the Republican Party haggle over the price of VA healthcare with the Democrats. The VA needed $30 billion and got $17 billion because the Republican Party wanted offsets to pay for health care. What a bunch of hypocritical so-called patriotic citizens. They didn’t complain about how to pay for the wars that just about bankrupted the country. But when it comes to the human cost of war they just toss them aside like garbage.

To the person who said that Russia is the same old brutal bunch, think of our invasion of Iraq as you look in the mirror. Brutal?

Yes, Bush tweaked the immigration laws for kids when it was a minor problem and humanitarian thing to do. Obama saw it as a loophole and opened our doors to a flood of thousands of illegals for his own political gain.

Ms. Tennant, as long as you persist in playing Capito-Lite, the only lights going out will be the ones in your campaign office.